The Hotel of Broken Hopes

"I can't stand the sight of expensive hotel lobbies anymore. In New York it has turned into some kind of surreal theater. You walk in on a Sunday evening, and at every other table sits a couple: a guy in a black suit and white shirt and a girl in a strict, modest dress. They all carry on the same tense conversations under the watchful eye of community acquaintances who 'happen' to be drinking coffee at the next table.

On one of those dates the guy was so nervous and followed his mother's list of questions so strictly that it felt like a customs interrogation. 'What are your spiritual goals for the next 5 years? How many hours a day does your father learn Torah? What school are you considering for your future children?' There wasn't a drop of genuine connection between us, just a checklist verification. I sat there, looking at all that crystal, the strained smiles around me, and I understood how this artificial environment kills any chance of simply sensing the person. We're trying to build the most intimate and holy thing — a family — under conditions of maximum publicity and falsehood."